The following morning, when Amaro saw that, according to the clock by his bed, it was nearly time for mass, he leaped joyfully out of bed. And as he pulled on the old overcoat that served him as a dressing gown, he was thinking about the morning in Feirão when he had woken up terrified because, the night before, for the first time since he had become a priest, he had sinned grossly with Joana Vaqueira on the straw in the barn. And he had not dared to say mass with that sin on his soul, for it weighed on him like a heavy stone. According to all the holy fathers and the sublime Council of Trent, he was contaminated, filthy, ripe for Hell. Three times he went up to the church door and three times he drew back in fear. He was convinced that if he were to touch the Eucharist with the same hands that had lifted Joana Vaqueira’s petticoats, the chapel would fall in on him or he would stand paralysed as he watched, rising up before the shrine, sword in hand, the glittering figure of St Michael the Avenger! He had got on his horse and ridden for two hours, past the claypits to Gralheira, to confess to good Father Sequeira. Those were the days of his innocence, the days of exaggerated piety and novice terrors! Now his eyes had been opened to the human reality around him. Parish priests, canons, cardinals and monsignors did not sin on the straw of barn floors, no, they did so in comfortable bedrooms, with their supper to hand. And the churches did not fall in on them, and St Michael the Avenger did not leave the comforts of Heaven for such trivial matters.
That was not what was worrying him, what was worrying him was Dionísia, whom he could hear moving around in the kitchen, clearing her throat; he did not even dare ask her for water so that he could shave. He disliked knowing that she had become a party to his secret. He did not doubt her discretion, that, after all, was her profession, and a few coins would ensure her loyalty. But it was repugnant to his priestly modesty to know that this old woman, who had been the concubine of both civil and military authorities, whose fat body had wallowed in the town’s murkiest secular goings-on, knew his weaknesses, knew of the physical desire that raged beneath his priest’s cassock. He would have preferred it if Silvério or Natário had been the ones to see him last night aflame with lust; that at least would have been between priests! What made him most uncomfortable was the idea of those little cynical eyes observing him, as unimpressed by the austerity of the cassock as by the respectability of uniforms, because they knew that underneath both lay the same wretched bestiality of the flesh.
‘That’s it,’ he thought, ‘I’ll give her a libra and send her away.’
There was a discreet knocking on the bedroom door.
‘Come in!’ said Amaro, sitting down at his desk, as if absorbed in some paperwork.
Dionísia came in, placed the jug of water on the stand, coughed and, addressing Amaro’s back, said:
‘Sir, things can’t go on like this. Yesterday someone nearly saw the girl leaving. That’s very bad. For everyone’s sake, secrecy is essential.’
No, he couldn’t dismiss her. The woman was forcing herself into his confidences. Those words, whispered in case the walls might hear, revealed the prudence of a professional and showed him the advantages of having such an experienced accomplice.
Red-faced, he turned round.
‘Someone saw, did they?’
‘Yes, it was only two drunks, but it could easily have been two gentlemen.’
‘That’s true.’
‘And given your position, Father, and the girl’s position . . . Everything must be done with the utmost secrecy. Not even the furniture in the room should know. In any affairs that come under my protection, I demand as much care as if we were dealing with a death!’
Amaro made a sudden decision to accept Dionísia’s protection.
He felt around in the drawer and placed half a libra in her hand.
‘May God bless you and keep you, my dear,’ she murmured.
‘So what do you think we should do next, Dionísia?’ he asked, leaning back in his chair, awaiting her expert advice.
She said quite naturally and without mystery or malice:
‘I think the best place to meet the young lady would be at the sexton’s house.’
‘The sexton’s house?’
She calmly reminded him how convenient the place was. As he himself knew, one of the rooms next to the sacristy gave onto a courtyard where a large shed had been built while the renovation work was being carried out. Well, the sexton’s house backed on to that. Senhor Esguelhas’s kitchen door opened onto the courtyard; it was just a matter of coming out of the sacristy, across the courtyard and there he would be in his lovenest!
‘And what about her?’
‘She can come in through the sexton’s front door, through the street door that opens onto the churchyard. No one ever goes by there, it’s a desert. And if someone did see her, she could say that she was taking a message to the sexton. That’s a very rough plan, but we can sort it out properly later.’
‘Yes, I see, so it’s more of a sketch,’ said Amaro, who was walking up and down the room, thinking.
‘I know the place well, Father, and, believe me, there’s not a better place for an ecclesiastical gentleman in your situation.’
Amaro stopped in front of her and said, laughing:
‘Tell me frankly, Dionísia, this isn’t the first time you’ve recommended the sexton’s house, is it?’
She stoutly denied this. She did not even know Senhor Esguelhas. But the idea had come to her in the night, when she was tossing and turning in bed. First thing in the morning, she had gone to look at the place and realised that it was ideal.
She cleared her throat, padded noiselessly over to the door, then turned to offer one last piece of advice:
‘All this depends, of course, on your coming to an arrangement with the sexton.’
This was exactly what was worrying Father Amaro now.
Amongst the servers and sacristans at the Cathedral, Esguelhas was thought of as ‘a miseryguts’. He had had one leg amputated and used a crutch to get around on. And certain priests, who wanted the job for one of their favourites, even said that, according to the Rule, this defect rendered him unfit to serve the Church. However, the former parish priest, José Miguéis, in obedience to the Bishop, had kept him on at the Cathedral, arguing that the disastrous fall that had occasioned the amputation had occurred in the belltower on the occasion of a religious festival and, thus, while Esguelhas was taking part in the ritual: ergo Our Lord had clearly indicated his intention not to get rid of Esguelhas. And when Amaro had taken over the parish, Esguelhas had used the influence of São Joaneira and Amélia to keep hold of the bell rope, as he put it. Apart from that (and this had been the view in Rua da Misericórdia), it was a charitable deed. Esguelhas was a widower and had a fifteen-year-old daughter who had been paralysed in the legs since she was a child. ‘The Devil certainly had it in for my family’s legs,’ Esguelhas used to say. It was doubtless this misfortune that made him seem so sad and withdrawn. It was said that the girl (whose name was Antónia, but whom her father called Totó) tormented him with her moods, her bad temper and her appalling stubbornness. Dr Gouveia declared her an ‘hysteric’, but all people of good principles were sure that Totó was possessed by the Devil. There had even been a plan to have her exorcised: the vicar general, however, always concerned about what the press might say, had hesitated to give his permission for the ritual to take place, and they had merely sprinkled her with some holy water, without any result. Otherwise, it was not known what form the girl’s ‘possession’ took: Dona Maria da Assunção had heard that she howled like a wolf; in another version, Dona Joaquina Gansoso assured everyone that the poor unfortunate tore her own flesh with her nails. Esguelhas, on the other hand, when asked about the girl, said only:
‘Well, she’s still here.’
Any hours not taken up with his work for the church were spent with his daughter in his little house. He only crossed the square to go to the pharmacy for some medicine or to buy cakes at Teresa’s shop. All day, that part of the Cathedral, the courtyard, the shed, the high wall beside it overgrown with nettles, the house at the rear, with its black-shuttered window set in a leprous wall, was sunk in silence, in dank shadow; and the choirboys, who sometimes risked tiptoeing across the courtyard to spy on Esguelhas, invariably found him bent over the fire, his pipe in his hand, spitting sadly into the ashes.
He respectfully heard mass every day with Father Amaro. And, on that particular morning, as Amaro was putting on his vestments and listening for the sound of Esguelhas’ crutch on the flagstones outside, he was already pondering the story he would tell Esguelhas, because he could not simply ask to use his room without explaining, somehow, that he required it for some religious purpose. And what other purpose could that be but to prepare, in secret and far from worldly distractions, some tender soul for the convent and for a life of holiness?
When Amaro saw Esguelhas come into the sacristy, he greeted him with a friendly ‘Good morning’. Esguelhas, he said, was looking the picture of health! Hardly surprising really, because, according to the holy fathers, the act of consecration gives bells a special quality, and being in the company of bells induces a sense of joy and well-being. He then jovially told Esguelhas and the two sacristans that, as a small boy living in the house of the Marquesa de Alegros, his one great wish had been to be a sexton . . .
They all laughed heartily, enchanted by the Father’s joke.
‘No, don’t laugh, it’s true. And I wouldn’t have been far off. In earlier days, it used to be the clerics of the minor orders who rang the bells. Our holy fathers consider them one of the most efficient routes to piety. There’s a poem about it, in which the bell itself speaks:
Which means, as you know: I praise God, I summon the people, I bring together the clergy, I mourn for the dead, I drive away plagues, I gladden festivals.’
He was already in his amice and alb, standing in the middle of the sacristy as he carefully recited these lines, and Esguelhas drew himself up on his crutch at these words which bestowed on him such unexpected authority and importance.
The sacristan was standing ready with the purple chasuble. But Amaro had not quite finished his glorification of bells; he went on to explain their ability to dispel storms (despite what some presumptuous sages may say to the contrary), not just because they communicate to the air the unction they receive from the blessing, but because they scatter any demons that might be wandering about amongst the gales and the thunderbolts. The holy Council of Milan recommends that the bells be rung whenever there is a storm.
‘Although in such cases, Esguelhas,’ he added, smiling solicitously at the sexton, ‘I would advise you not to take the risk. After all, it does involve being high up and close to the storm itself . . . Right, come on then, Matias.’
And as the chasuble was placed over his shoulders, he murmured gravely:
‘Domine, quis dixisti jugum meum . . . Tie it a bit tighter behind, Matias. Suave est, et onus meum leve . . .’
He bowed to the cross and went into the church in the prescribed manner, eyes lowered and body erect, while Matias, scuffing one foot, bowed briefly to the crucifix in the sacristy, then hurried after Amaro with the ciborium, coughing loudly to clear his throat.
During mass, as he turned to the nave during the Offertory at the Orate fratres, Father Amaro (with a benevolence permitted by the ritual) addressed himself always to the sexton, as if the Sacrifice had been made especially for him, and Esguelhas, with his crutch resting beside him, plunged into a more than usually respectful devotion. Even at the Benedicat, having begun the blessing facing the altar to draw from the well of God’s mercy, Amaro completed the Blessing and turned slowly back again to Esguelhas, as if to present to him alone the Graces and Gifts of Our Lord.
‘Esguelhas,’ he said quietly as they went back into the sacristy, ‘go and wait for me in the courtyard, will you. I need to talk to you.’
He soon rejoined him, looking suitably grave.
‘Put your hat back on, Esguelhas. I have a serious matter to discuss with you. I’d actually like to ask you a favour.’
‘Father!’
No, it was not a favour exactly, because when it came to serving God, we all had a duty to do our utmost to help. There was a young woman who wanted to become a nun. In fact, to show what confidence he had in him, he would tell him her name.
‘It’s São Joaneira’s Amélia!’
‘Really, Father?’
‘She has such a strong vocation, Esguelhas! She has clearly been marked out by the finger of God! It’s quite extraordinary . . .’
He then told him a long story which he laboriously made up as he went along, depending on the feelings he imagined he could see on the sexton’s astonished face. The girl had lost interest in life after the disagreement she had had with her fiancé. But her mother, who was getting on in years and who needed her to look after the house, was withholding her consent, assuming this interest to be just a passing fancy. But it was no fancy, it was her true vocation. He was sure of it. Unfortunately, when there was any kind of opposition, a priest had to tread very carefully. Every day, the heretical newspapers (which were, alas, the majority) inveighed against the influence of the clergy. The authorities, even more heretical than the newspapers, put obstacles in their way. There were some truly draconian laws . . . If they knew that he was instructing the girl so that she could take the veil, they would lock him up! What could one expect? We were living in heretical, atheistic times! He needed to have many long conversations with the girl, to test her, to understand her temperament, to see if she was best suited to Solitude and Penance or to helping the sick, to Perpetual Adoration or to teaching. In short, he must know her inside and out.
‘But where can I do this?’ he exclaimed, opening wide his arms as if distraught to find himself frustrated in his saintly duty. ‘Where? It couldn’t be in her mother’s house, because they were already suspicious. Meeting in the church would be tantamount to meeting in the street. She’s still only a young girl, and so we couldn’t possibly meet at my house . . .’
‘Of course not.’
‘And so, Esguelhas . . . and I’m sure you’ll thank me for this . . . I thought of your house.’
‘Oh, Father,’ said the sexton, ‘I, my house and everything in it are at your disposal.’
‘It’s to help a soul and will be a source of great joy to Our Lord . . .’
‘And to me, Father, and to me!’
Esguelhas’ only concern was that the house was not worthy and not comfortable enough . . .
‘Really!’ said Amaro, smiling, as if renouncing all human comforts. ‘As long as there are two chairs and a table on which to place the prayer book . . .’
On the other hand, said the sexton, if they wanted a quiet, private house, it was perfect. He and his daughter lived there like two monks in the desert. On the days when Father Amaro was there, he would go off for his walk. They couldn’t use the kitchen, of course, because poor Totó’s room was next to it, but there was always his bedroom upstairs.
Father Amaro struck his head with his hand. He had forgotten about Totó.
‘That spoils our little plan, Esguelhas!’ he exclaimed.
But the sexton was quick to reassure him. He was now caught up in this conquest of a bride for Our Lord; he wanted his roof to provide shelter for the holy preparation of that young girl’s soul . . . Perhaps it would draw down God’s pity on him. He warmly recommended the house’s many advantages and facilities. Totó wouldn’t be in the way. She never left her bed. Father Amaro would come in through the kitchen from the sacristy and Amélia through the street door; they could then go upstairs and shut themselves in his room.
‘And what does Totó do?’ asked Father Amaro, still hesitant.
The poor thing spent all her time in bed . . . She went through phases: sometimes she would make dolls and lavish such love on them that she gave herself a fever; at others she lay in terrible silence, staring at the wall. But then again she could be cheerful and chatty . . . It really was a great misfortune.
‘She should entertain herself, she should read,’ said Father Amaro, just to show interest.
The sexton sighed. She did not know how to read, she had never learned. That was exactly what he said to her: if she could read, life would weigh less heavily on her. But she had a horror of applying herself to anything. Perhaps Father Amaro would be so kind as to try and persuade her when he came to the house.
But Amaro was not listening, absorbed in an idea that had lit up his face with a smile. He had stumbled upon a natural pretext to give to São Joaneira and her friends for Amélia’s visits to the sexton’s house: she was teaching the paralysed girl to read. She was educating her! Opening her soul to the beauties of holy books, to the stories of the martyrs and to prayer!
‘It’s decided then, Esguelhas,’ he declared, gleefully rubbing his hands. ‘Your house will be the place where we will make the girl a saint. But,’ and he lowered his voice, ‘this is our secret.’
‘Please, Father!’ said the sexton, almost offended.
‘I’m counting on you,’ said Amaro.
He went straight back to the sacristy to write a note that he would pass secretly to Amélia and in which he would explain in detail the arrangements he had made ‘to enable them to enjoy new and divine joys’. He warned her that the pretext for her to visit the sexton’s house every week would be the education of Esguelhas’ paralysed daughter; he would put forward the idea that night when he came to the house. ‘After all,’ he said, ‘there is a grain of truth in it, for it would indeed be pleasing to God if the darkness of that soul could be illuminated with some religious instruction. And thus, my dear, we would kill two birds with one stone.’
Then he went home. He sat down at the breakfast table feeling very pleased with himself, with life and with the sweet facilities with which life furnished him. The jealousy, the torments of desire, the solitude of the flesh, everything that had consumed him for months and months, first in Rua da Misericórdia and then in Rua das Sousas, had passed. He was at last comfortably installed in happiness! And in a state of dumb enchantment, his fork forgotten in his hand, he remembered the previous night and the whole of that half hour, pleasure by pleasure, mentally savouring them, one by one, gorging himself on the certainty of possession – the way a farmer walks the small newly acquired field that his eyes have coveted for years. He would no longer cast bitter sideways glances at the gentlemen out strolling by the river with their ladies on their arm! He now had his own lovely lady, all his, body and soul, who adored him, who wore good linen, and whose breasts smelled of eau-de-cologne! He was, it is true, a priest . . . but he had an argument for that too: as long as a priest’s behaviour was not a cause for scandal amongst the faithful, then it in no way damaged the efficacy, usefulness and grandeur of religion. All the theologians teach that the order of priests was instituted to administer the sacraments; what mattered was that the people should receive the inner, supernatural sanctity contained in the sacraments, and provided that these were dispensed according to the consecrated formulae, what did it matter whether the priest was a saint or a sinner? The sacrament still carried within it the same beneficial qualities. It did so not through the merits of the priest, but through the merits of Jesus Christ. If someone was baptized or anointed, it mattered not if it was by pure hands or soiled, they would still be washed clean of original sin or well prepared for eternal life. This is clear in the writings of all the holy fathers, and was established by the lofty Council of Trent itself. As regards their soul or their salvation, the faithful lose nothing through the unworthiness of the parish priest. And if that priest repents at the final hour, the gates of Heaven will not be closed to him. In short, all’s well that ends well. These were Father Amaro’s thoughts as he happily sipped his coffee.
After lunch, Dionísia came in, all smiles, to find out if he had spoken to Esguelhas.
‘Yes I did mention it, just in passing,’ he said ambiguously. ‘But nothing’s decided yet. Rome wasn’t built in a day you know.’
‘Ah,’ she said.
And she withdrew to the kitchen, thinking that the parish priest lied like a heretic. Not that she cared. She had never liked working with ecclesiastical gentlemen – they paid badly and were always so mistrustful . . .
And when she heard Amaro going out, she ran to the stairs and reminded him that she did, in fact, have her own house to look after, and so when he found another maid . . .
‘Dona Josefa Dias is sorting that out for me, Dionísia. I hope to have someone tomorrow. But drop round now and then . . . now that we’re friends.’
‘If you ever need me, you just have to call down to me in the yard,’ she said from the top of the stairs. ‘Anything at all . . . I know a little about a lot of things, even removing any problems, shall we say, or helping with a birth . . . Indeed, while we’re on the subject . . .’
But Amaro was not listening: he slammed the door and fled, incensed by that clumsy, immodest offer of help.
He first brought up the matter of the sexton’s daughter in São Joaneira’s house a few days later.
He had given the note to Amélia the previous evening and, now, while the others were chatting loudly in the living room, he went over to the piano where Amélia was lazily running her fingers up and down the scales. Bending down to light his cigarette on the candle, he murmured:
‘Did you read it?’
‘Yes, it’s an excellent idea!’
Amaro immediately rejoined the circle of ladies, where Dona Joaquina Gansoso was describing the disaster that had taken place in England and which she had read about in the newspaper: a coal mine had collapsed, burying 120 workers. The old ladies shuddered in horror. Pleased at the effect her words had had, Dona Joaquina Gansoso piled on more details: the people outside had struggled to free the unfortunate miners; they could hear their moans beneath the earth; it all took place in the encroaching darkness in the middle of a snow storm . . .
‘Most unpleasant!’ grunted the Canon, snug in his armchair, enjoying the warmth of the room and the safety of a roof.
Dona Maria da Assunção declared that all those mines and those foreign machines filled her with fear. She had seen a factory near Alcobaçã and it had seemed to her to be an image of Hell. She was sure that Our Lord did not view them kindly . . .
‘It’s like railways,’ said Dona Josefa. ‘I’m convinced they’re the Devil’s work. I’m not joking. The howls, the flames, the noise! It sends shivers down my spine!’
Father Amaro laughed out loud, assuring Dona Josefa that they were a wonderfully comfortable way to travel at speed. Then he immediately grew serious and added:
‘There’s no question, though, that these inventions of modern science do have a touch of the Devil about them. That is why our Holy Church blesses them, first with prayers and then with holy water. Surely you know about this custom. The holy water exorcises them and drives out the Enemy Spirit, and the prayers redeem them from the original sin which exists not only in man, but also in everything he makes. That is why locomotives are always blessed and purified . . . So that the Devil cannot use them for his own ends.’
Dona Maria da Assunção immediately demanded an explanation. How exactly did the Enemy use railways for his own ends?
Father Amaro kindly enlightened her. The Enemy had many ways of doing so, but what he usually did was to derail the train, thus killing the passengers, and since those souls had not received the last rites, the Devil took immediate possession of them, right there and then.
‘The villain!’ snorted the Canon, feeling a secret admiration for the Enemy’s wiles.
Dona Maria da Assunção fanned herself languorously, her face bathed in a beatific smile.
‘Ah, ladies,’ she said slowly to those around her, ‘that won’t ever happen to us. We won’t be caught unprepared.’
It was true, and they all savoured for a moment the delicious certainty that they would be prepared and would thus thwart the Tempter’s malicious intentions.
Father Amaro coughed as if about to say something, and then, resting both hands on the table, he said in a very practical tone:
‘One must be constantly vigilant if one is to keep the Devil at bay. I was thinking about this only today (indeed it was the subject of my meditation) in respect of a most unfortunate case almost on the Cathedral’s doorstep. The sexton’s little daughter . . .’
The ladies had drawn their chairs closer, drinking in his words, their curiosity suddenly aroused, hoping to hear some piquant story about the Devil’s misdeeds. Amaro continued speaking in a voice made more solemn by the surrounding silence.
‘The girl spends the whole day in bed. She cannot read, she performs no religious devotions, she is not in the habit of meditating, and, as a consequence, she is, to use St Clement’s phrase, “a defenceless soul”. So what happens? The Devil, who is always on the watch and never misses a trick, makes himself at home there. That is the origin, as poor Esguelhas was telling me today, of her fits of fury and despair, of her motiveless rages . . . The poor man has a truly wretched life.’
‘And just two steps away from the Lord’s church!’ exclaimed Dona Maria da Assunção, enraged by Satan’s impudence in installing himself in a body and in a bed that were separated from the Cathedral walls by only a narrow courtyard.
‘You’re quite right. It’s an absolute scandal. But if the girl cannot read, if she knows no prayers, if she has no one to instruct her or to bring the word of God to her, no one to give her strength and teach her how to frustrate the Enemy . . .’
He got resolutely to his feet and paced about the room, shoulders bowed, like a shepherd grieving over the fact that a force greater than him has snatched away a beloved sheep. Exalted by his own words, he was filled by genuine pity and compassion for that poor child for whom the agony of immobility must be made even worse by the lack of any consolation.
The ladies looked at him, saddened by that unfortunate example of a neglected soul, especially since it was clearly a source of pain to Father Amaro.
Dona Maria da Assunção rapidly ran through her abundant arsenal of devotional objects and suggested placing a few saints at her bedhead, St Vincent, for example, or Our Lady of the Seven Wounds . . . But her friends’ silence eloquently expressed the inadequacy of that devout gallery.
‘You may say to me,’ said Father Amaro, sitting down again, ‘that she is merely the daughter of the sexton. But she has a soul, she has a soul like ours!’
‘Everyone has a right to the grace of God,’ said the Canon gravely and impartially, acknowledging the equality of the classes as long as it was only in respect of Heaven’s comforts and not material goods.
‘As far as God is concerned, there are no rich and poor,’ sighed São Joaneira. ‘In fact it’s better to be poor, for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven.’
‘Better to be rich you mean,’ said the Canon, holding out one hand to halt that false interpretation of divine law. ‘For Heaven is also for the rich. You have misunderstood the precept. Beati pauperes, blessed are the poor, means that the poor should be content with their poverty and not covet the property of the rich, nor want more than the mouthful of bread that they have, nor aspire to share the wealth of others, for if they do, they will no longer be blessed. That is why, Senhora, the rabble that preaches that the workers and the lower classes should live better than they do are going against the express will of the Church and of Our Lord and deserve to be horsewhipped like the excommunicants that they are! Uf!’
And he lay back in his chair, exhausted by this long speech. Father Amaro, meanwhile, said nothing, leaning one elbow on the table and slowly rubbing his head. He was about to launch his idea, as if it were a divine inspiration, and suggest that Amélia should carry out the religious education of the poor paralysed child. But his entirely carnal, concupiscent motive made him pause superstitiously. The sexton’s daughter appeared to him now in exaggerated form, plunged in a dark abyss of agony. He felt the thrill of charity in consoling her, entertaining her, making her days less bitter. Surely that action would redeem many sins, would delight God, if done in the pure spirit of Christian brotherhood. He felt a kind young man’s sentimental compassion for the wretched body pinned to that bed, never seeing the sun or the street. And he sat there, awkward and undecided, scratching his neck, wishing he had never mentioned Totó to the ladies . . .
But Dona Joaquina Gansoso had an idea:
‘What if we sent her that book full of paintings of the lives of the saints, Father? They’re so edifying. I found them terribly touching . . . You’ve got it, haven’t you, Amélia?’
‘No, I haven’t got it,’ Amélia said, without glancing up from her sewing.
Then Amaro looked at her. He had almost forgotten about her. She was on the other side of the table to him, hemming a duster: the slender parting in her hair was almost lost amongst her thick, abundant locks, on which the oil lamp beside her cast a line of lustrous light; her eyelashes seemed longer and blacker against the warm brown skin of her cheek, flushed with rose; her close-fitting dress formed a crease at the shoulder and rose amply over the round shape of her breasts, which he saw rise and fall with her regular breathing . . . That was the part of her beauty he loved most; he imagined her breasts to be round and full and the colour of snow; he had held her in his arms, but she had been clothed, and his urgent hands had met only cold silk. But in the sexton’s house, they would be his, with no obstacles, no clothes, at the entire disposal of his lips. Dear God! And there was nothing to prevent them consoling Totó’s soul at the same time! He hesitated no longer. And raising his voice above the babble of old ladies now discussing the disappearance of The Lives of the Saints.
‘No, ladies, it is not books that the girl needs. Do you know what I think? One of us, the one with most time to spare, should take the word of God to her and educate her soul!’ And he added, smiling: ‘And if truth be told, the person with most time on her hands here is Miss Amélia.’
What a surprise! It seemed like the will of Our Lord himself had come to him in a revelation. The ladies’ eyes lit up with devout excitement at the idea of that charitable mission having its origins right there in Rua da Misericórdia . . . Enraptured, they greedily anticipated the praise of both the precentor and the Cathedral chapter. Each one proffered her advice, eager to take part in the holy work and to share the rewards that Heaven would doubtless shower down upon them. Dona Joaquina Gansoso declared warmly that she envied Amélia and was very shocked when Amélia burst out laughing.
‘Do you think I would not do it with the same devotion? You’re already proud that you will be the one carrying out the good work . . . That kind of attitude will do you no good, you know!’
But Amélia was in the grip of hysteria, leaning back in her chair, struggling to choke back her laughter.
Dona Joaquina’s eyes flashed.
‘It’s indecent,’ she cried, ‘positively indecent!’
They calmed her down, and Amélia had to swear on the Holy Gospels that she had merely had a silly thought and was generally in a nervous state . . .
‘Well,’ said Dona Maria da Assunção, ‘she’s quite right to be proud. It’s an honour for the house. When people find out . . .’
Amaro said severely:
‘But they mustn’t find out, Dona Maria! Of what use, in the eyes of God, are good works that are a cause of boasting and vanity?’
Dona Maria bowed her shoulders, humbling herself before the reprimand. And Father Amaro went on gravely:
‘It must go no further than this room. It is between God and us. We want to save a soul, to console someone who is sick, not to be praised in the newspapers. Isn’t that so, Canon?’
The Canon sat up slowly:
‘You have spoken tonight with the golden tongue of St John Chrysostom. I am greatly edified, and now I could do with some toast.’
While Ruça was preparing the tea, they decided that, in secret, so that the action would prove more valuable in the eyes of God, Amélia would go once or twice a week, according to the degree of her devotion, to spend an hour at the paralysed girl’s bedside in order to read to her from The Lives of the Saints, to teach her some prayers and to inspire her with virtue.
‘One thing is certain,’ said Dona Maria da Assunção, turning to Amélia, ‘you’re a very lucky girl!’
Ruça came in with the tray, in the midst of the laughter provoked by ‘Dona Maria’s foolishness’ as Amélia put it, Amélia having blushed scarlet. And thus it was that she and Father Amaro were able to see each other freely, to the greater glory of God and the humiliation of the Enemy.
They met every week, sometimes once, sometimes twice, so that, by the end of the month, their charitable visits to Totó had reached the symbolic number of seven, which should, in the minds of the devout, have corresponded to The Seven Sorrows of Mary. Father Amaro would warn Esguelhas the night before, and Esguelhas would leave the street door ajar, having first swept the whole house and prepared the bedroom for the priest’s work. On those days, Amélia got up early: she always had a white petticoat to starch or a bow to make; her mother was bemused by these affectations and by the quantity of eau-de-cologne with which she drenched herself; but Amélia explained that it was ‘in order to inspire Totó with ideas of cleanliness and freshness’. Once dressed, she would sit and wait for eleven to strike, looking very serious, her face flushed, her eyes fixed on the hands of the clock, responding distractedly to her mother’s remarks; at last, the old contraption would grind out a cavernous eleven o’clock and then, with one last glance in the mirror, she would leave, planting a large kiss on her mother’s cheek.
She was always apprehensive, afraid that someone might see her. Every morning, she prayed to Our Lady of Safe Journeys to keep her from unfortunate encounters, and if she saw a poor person, she would invariably give them alms, to placate the Good Lord, friend to beggars and vagabonds. The most frightening part was the Cathedral square over which Amparo in the pharmacy kept an incessant vigil as she sat at the window, sewing. Amélia would shrink into her cape then and keep her sunshade low over her face as she went into the Cathedral, always right foot first.
She found the silence of the church, deserted and drowsing in the wan light, equally terrifying; the taciturn saints and crosses seemed to be chiding her for her sin; she imagined that the glass eyes of the images and the painted pupils of the pictures were fixed on her with cruel insistence and that they noticed how her breast rose and fell at the thought of the pleasure to come. Sometimes, in the grip of superstition and in order to fend off the disapproval of the saints, she would even promise to devote the whole morning to Totó and to give all her charitable attentions only to her, and not to allow Father Amaro so much as to touch her dress. But if, when she went into the sexton’s house, she did not find Amaro there, she would not even pause at the foot of Totó’s bed, but go straight to the kitchen window, to keep watch on the thick sacristy door, every one of whose black iron studs she now knew individually.
He would arrive at last. It was the beginning of March; the swallows had returned; they could be heard twittering in the melancholy silence as they flew amongst the buttresses of the Cathedral. Here and there, plants that favour dank places clothed the corners in dark green. Amaro would sometimes gallantly pick her a flower, but Amélia would grow impatient and tap on the window. He would hurry then, and they would stand for a moment at the door, hands clasped, their shining eyes devouring each other; and then they would go in and see Totó and give her the cakes that Amaro always brought for her in the pocket of his cassock.
Totó’s bed was in the small bedroom next to the kitchen. Her scrawny body was barely visible on the sagging mattress, beneath filthy blankets the edges of which she spent her time unpicking. On those days, she had taken to wearing a white dressing gown, and her hair gleamed with oil, for lately, since Father Amaro’s visits, ‘she had got it into her head that she wanted to look proper’ as a delighted Esguelhas put it, to the point that she would not be parted from the mirror and comb that she hid under her pillow, and she had instructed her father to stow under the bed, amongst the dirty bedclothes, the dolls which now she scorned.
Amélia would sit down for a moment at the foot of the bed and ask Totó if she had studied her ABC, making her pronounce the occasional letter. Then she would ask her to repeat correctly the prayer she had been teaching her, while the priest waited on the threshold, his hands in his pockets, bored and embarrassed by the paralysed girl’s shining eyes, which never left him for a moment, penetrating him, exploring his body with ardour and astonishment, eyes that seemed even larger and more brilliant in her dark face, so gaunt that her cheekbones were clearly visible beneath the skin. He felt neither compassion nor charity for Totó; he hated that delay; he found the girl coarse and irritating. These moments dragged for Amélia too, when she resigned herself to talking to the girl, in order not to scandalise Our Lord too much. Totó seemed to hate her and either responded irritably or else lay in rancorous silence, her face turned to the wall; one day, she even tore up the alphabet, and she would shrink away angrily if Amélia tried to rearrange the shawl around her shoulders or smooth the bedclothes.
Finally, Amaro would grow impatient and make a sign to Amélia, and she would set before Totó the picture book of The Lives of the Saints.
‘There you are, now you look at the pictures. There’s St Matthew, and that’s St Virginia. Bye-bye now. I’m going upstairs with Father Amaro to pray to God to give you good health and to help you to walk . . . No, don’t spoil the book, that’s naughty.’
And when they went upstairs, Totó would crane her neck after them, eyes flashing then filling with angry tears as she listened to the stairs creaking. The room above was very low with no ceiling, just the black beams on which the tiles rested. Beside the bed hung a small oil lamp that left a stain on the wall like a black plume of smoke. And Amaro always used to laugh at the preparations Esguelhas had made – the table in one corner with a copy of the New Testament on it, and a jug of water and two chairs on either side.
‘It’s for our class, so that I can teach you the duties of a nun,’ he said, laughing.
‘Teach me, then!’ she would murmur, as she stood before Amaro, a warm smile on her lips revealing her white teeth, and her arms flung wide, offering herself up to him.
He would shower voracious kisses on her neck and hair; sometimes he would bite her ear and she would utter a little yelp, after which they would both stand for a moment utterly still, listening, afraid of the paralysed girl downstairs. Then Amaro would close the shutters and the door, which was so stiff he had to press hard against it with his knee. Amélia would slowly get undressed and would remain for a moment immobile, her petticoats fallen around her feet, a white shape in the darkness of the room. Amaro, nearby, would be breathing hard. Then she would hurriedly make the sign of the cross and give a sad little sigh as she climbed onto the bed.
Amélia could only stay until midday, which is why Amaro hung his watch on the nail holding the oil lamp in place. But even when they did not hear the chimes of the clock, Amélia could tell the time from the crowing of a neighbouring cockerel.
‘I must go now, my love,’ she would say wearily.
‘Stay. You’re always in such a hurry.’
They would lie in silence for a while longer, cuddled up close to each other, in sweet lassitude. Through the spaces between the roof beams they could see cracks of light; sometimes they heard a cat padding across, occasionally catching a loose tile as it passed; or a bird would alight, singing, and they would hear the rustle of its wings.
‘It’s time I went,’ Amélia would say.
Amaro wanted to make her stay longer and would keep kissing her ear.
‘Greedy thing!’ she would murmur. ‘Stop it!’
Then she would get dressed quickly in the dark, open the window, once more embrace Amaro, who lay stretched out on the bed, and, finally, she would move the table and the chairs, so that the paralysed girl downstairs would hear and know that their class was over.
Amaro would not stop kissing her, and so, to draw things to a close, she would run away from him and fling open the door; Amaro would go down the stairs, stride through the kitchen without so much as a glance at Totó and walk across to the sacristy.
Amélia, on the other hand, would go and see Totó to find out if she had liked the pictures. Sometimes she would find her hiding with her head under the blankets, which she held down with her hands; at other times, sitting up in bed, Totó would scrutinise Amélia with eyes that flickered with lewd curiosity; she would put her face up close to Amélia’s, her nostrils dilated as if to sniff her; troubled, Amélia drew back, blushing; it was getting late, she would say, then pick up her Lives of the Saints and leave, cursing that creature and her malicious silence.
When she crossed the square at that hour, she always saw Amparo at her window. She had even thought it prudent to tell her in confidence of her charitable visits to Totó. As soon as Amparo saw her, she would call down and, leaning over the balcony, ask:
‘So how is Totó?
‘Can she read yet?’
‘She can spell.’
‘And what about the prayer to Our Lady?’
‘Oh, she can say that already.’
‘Such devotion, my dear!’
Amélia would modestly lower her eyes. And Carlos, who was also in on the secret, would leave the counter to come to the door and admire Amélia.
‘Back from your great mission of mercy, eh?’ he would say with wide, admiring eyes, as he swayed back and forth on the toes of his slippered feet.
‘Oh, I just spend a bit of time with her, to distract her . . .’
‘Marvellous!’ murmured Carlos. ‘The work of a true apostle! Off you go, my saintly girl, and give my regards to your mother.’
Then he would go back inside and say to his assistant:
‘Do you see that, Senhor Augusto? Instead of wasting her time on love affairs like other girls, she makes herself a guardian angel. She spends the flower of her youth with a cripple! Do you think philosophy, materialism and all that other rubbish could inspire such actions? No, only religion could, my dear sir. I wish all the Renans of this world and that whole band of philosophers could see this! Don’t get me wrong, sir, I admire philosophy when it goes hand in hand with religion . . . I’m a man of science and I admire Newton and Guizot, but, mark my words, in ten years’ time, Senhor Augusto, philosophy will be dead and buried!’
And he continued pacing about the pharmacy, hands behind his back, pondering the death of philosophy.